Wisdom and Virtue
in Philosophical Counselling (ii)
Practical Philosophy July 2000 Volume 3.2 Pages 13-17
Jess Fleming
In the first part of this
paper, published
in Practical Philosophy 3:1, Jess Fleming compiled a list of virtues which
he tentatively suggested philosophical counsellors should aspire to. This
is the second and concluding part of his paper.
Now I want to try to renounce,
undo, and subvert most of what I’ve said so far, which I’m afraid that
you may find exasperating, even dismaying.
But, after all, do we not learn in philosophy that there are always
(at least) two sides to every issue (otherwise it wouldn’t be an issue). So far I’ve portrayed virtue and wisdom in
a rather conventional way, but now I want to look at the other side. I’m going to try to upset my own apple cart.
I have at least three different kinds of counter-arguments which
I will marshal not really to undermine all that I’ve said above, but to
show that it is thus far incomplete in an important way.
I began by saying that I want to defend 'uncommon sense' 'divine
madness,' and so forth, and I want to now acknowledge a debt to, and the
influence of, Schopenhauer. For, like Schopenhauer, I see a close kinship
between madness and genius (not a very original thesis I admit, since
many other thinkers from the Romantic poets to Freud have suggested as
much). I worry that the result
of all this philosophical counselling will be individuals (both counsellors
and clients) who are well adapted, conventional, well-behaving, and mediocre
in living and thinking. Let me
quote Schopenhauer so you can perhaps see why I fear that we may be in
the business of stifling genius with all this 'virtue' and 'wisdom.' Schopenhauer said, “…no cool or sober man can
be a genius”; he also said,
“…even the extremely intelligent and rational man, whom we might almost
call wise, is very different from the genius; and indeed he is so because
his intellect retains a practical [Schopenhauer’s emphasis] tendency.” How so? Schopenhauer
elaborates, “In fact, every child is to a certain extent a genius, and
every genius to a certain extent a child. The relationship between the two shows itself primarily in the naivety
and sublime ingenuousness that are fundamental characteristics of true
genius… Therefore every genius is already a big child, since he looks
out into the world as into something strange and foreign… Accordingly,
just like the child, he does not have the dull gravity and earnestness
of ordinary men, who, being capable of nothing but subjective interests,
always see in things merely motives for their actions.
He who throughout his life does not, to a certain extent, remain
a big child, but becomes an earnest, sober, thoroughly composed and rational
man, can be a very useful and capable citizen of this world; but he will
never be a genius.” I know what you are thinking, or at least I
think I do, based on what I would think if I heard someone cite this passage
from Schopenhauer. Schopenhauer’s key point is that the genius is not
practical; he is not interested in furthering his personal interests,
or indeed in any particular material thing, but only in the universal
(i.e. the Platonic 'Forms'), in which he has no personal interest. Thus, such a person has what is in Aristotle’s
view is essential to a life of eudaimonia,
namely the intellectual virtue of 'theoretical wisdom' (sophia), but such a person lacks 'practical wisdom' (phronesis), which is the ability to judge
changing circumstances and choose ends and means wisely. From an Aristotelian perspective such a person
is a lopsided monstrosity, having fulfilled only the highest part of his
human nature, but having neglected to fulfil other moral and intellectual
'virtues' (aretai, 'excellences')
such as justice (dikaiosyne)
and moderation (sophrosyne). You must also be wondering if I mean to suggest that philosophical
counselling is always in danger of pandering to mediocrity and turning
every client into a stifled genius, a pedestrian bourgeois. Of course not. As Schopenhauer says, and as we all know, the Einsteins, Picassos,
and Beethovens of the world are few and far between. But, still, the point is that mere wisdom may
be a short-sighted goal in rare (very rare) cases of philosophical counselling.
Imagine if some philosophical counsellor had gotten his hands on
Nietzsche or Van Gogh – we might today have no Zarathustra or Sunflowers.
So, this is my first argument against the rather conventional picture
of virtue and wisdom which I outlined in the first half of my paper. Fortunately, Schopenhauer’s remarks about the
virtue of being childlike lead smoothly into my next argument based on
the eccentric and exotic philosophy of Chuang Tzu (4th c. B.C.,
Taoist philosopher from China).
In the classical Chinese
language in which early philosophical texts, such as the Chuang Tzu, were written, the word for virtue is te, and it is interesting that in Taoist
philosophy te, like the Greek
word arete and the English word virtue, has
both a moral meaning and an amoral meaning.
Morally speaking, it is closely associated with the concept of
fate (ming).
For example, Chuang Tzu, like most Chinese today thinks that many
important life events, as well as one’s death, are destined, and that
it is a virtue or sign of wisdom if one is able to stoically resign oneself
to the inevitable, and remain tranquil in the face of such fated events
and transitions. The amoral meaning
of 'te' lies in its close association with
the concept of Tao (from whence Taoism derives its name). Generally speaking, we can say that the Tao
signifies the source and origin of all things, and also the 'great reservoir'
to which they will in the end return.
The Tao is also characterised as 'non-being' (wu, as in wu wei, non-action), and as the natural process
of cyclic, seasonal, change which encompasses and embraces all things.
Te, we may say is the Tao individuated and manifested in the inborn
natures of all things. Thus, for
Chuang Tzu virtue (te), signifies
the ability not only to live in accord with one’s external destiny and
one’s internal nature, but also the ability to nourish the indefiniteness,
uncertainty, the non-being (or emptiness) at one’s core, allowing one
to live in creative, spontaneous, novel ways, which in fact benefit all
around one, but without intending to benefit either oneself or others. For Chuang Tzu it is essential to forget oneself,
and forget others. Trying too
hard to be good or benevolent, as the Confucians do, is he thinks counterproductive
and self-defeating. Chuang Tzu
says that, “When the Tao is lost, virtue (te) arises; when virtue is lost, benevolence
(jen) arises; and when benevolence
is lost, righteousness (yi)
arises.” In other words, conventional
morality which emphasises typical virtues such as benevolence and righteousness,
is a sign of decline from a state of nature, when men lived with one another
in an anarchic utopia, without laws, leaders, government, tradition, culture,
education, etc. – all of which to Chuang Tzu are so much useless baggage.
It is best, I think, to interpret this myth metaphorically, as
saying that there are three levels of moral development.
Lowest is when men behave selfishly and viciously, seeking fame,
fortune, and (political) power. Next
highest is when men learn to care for one another and have feelings of
shame, guilt, fellow-feeling, duty, and so forth.
But, somewhat like Nietzsche, the highest level of moral development
is “beyond good and evil.” One
is able to imitate the Tao and live with others, as the animals do, namely
with no inflexible social hierarchy, self-consciousness, or feelings duty
or shame, and yet in a natural condition of harmony and mutual benefit.
This may sound unrealistic, but I think it is not difficult to
think of examples of behaviour (either by individuals, or governments),
whose well-intended 'moral' behaviour backfired and actually harmed the
intended beneficiary of our good intentions, and there are similarly examples
where by not intervening or trying to improve the situation, or help others,
the situation corrects itself. What
this means for philosophical counselling is manifold. First of all don’t try too hard, in fact often it is best to leave
things alone and do nothing (wu
wei), or do something unexpected
and innovative. Are you sure,
Chuang Tzu would ask, there are no situations when it is better to be
cowardly, impatient, insincere, proud, upset, inattentive, etc. towards
your client, and is it inconceivable that the client might not thrive
better in his crisis or predicament by behaving in similarly unexpected
ways? Chuang Tzu’s philosophy is a kind of epistemological perspectivalism,
with many stories about animals illustrating that we humans falsely assume
to know definitely and absolutely what is true and false, what is beautiful
and ugly, what is useful and what is useless, but we forget that we are
viewing things (such as our natural environment) from a limited, human,
perspective, which is not necessarily superior to the perspectives of
other creatures. Thus, how can
we be certain that courage, honesty, sincerity, and so forth are really
virtues? Perhaps from some different perspective they
are actually harmful vices.
Furthermore, integral to
Taoist thought, is the yin/yang polarity. Yin and yang, of course designate the two great
forces at work in the universe, as impersonal agents of, or manifestations
of, the Tao, such that when they are balanced (as in a person’s metabolism,
or lifestyle) all is well. But
they also symbolise all other polarised dichotomies which we assume to
be mutually exclusive and together exhaustive.
True/false, beautiful/ugly, useful/useless, life/death, action/inaction,
wisdom/folly, virtue/vice, are other examples of so-called opposites (whether
contradictories or contraries), which in fact lie on a continuum and cyclically
transmute into one another. Thus,
'courage' in fact is cowardice (only in a minimal degree), 'honesty' in
fact is a form of dishonesty, 'sincerity' is a form of insincerity, and
vice versa. This sounds facetious, facile, and fallacious, but are there no
examples of seeming honesty which in fact is in the service of dishonesty
(half-truths, for example)? Can
one not imagine an example of apparent cowardice which in fact could be
viewed from a different perspective as courage?
And has Sartre not also shown that 'sincerity' (the attempt to
be and show what one essentially is) is a sign of insincerity and bad
faith? For philosophical counselling, this implies
that there may be times when it is better to cultivate what are conventionally
considered vices, such as lethargy and indifference, rather than empathy
and warm concern. I can think
of at least one occasion when I myself went to a fellow professor for
more or less philosophical advice/counselling, and his cool indifference
and apparent unconcern were helpful to me, helping me to see that my problem
was not as serious as I thought, and that it might be better to laugh
it off and go on with other things. As
for 'wisdom' in particular, I have no doubt that Chuang Tzu would say
that much of what passes for wisdom is from a different perspective, foolish,
and much of what appears foolish or even mad, is from a different perspective,
adaptive survival behaviour. Chuang Tzu has numerous amusing, yet profound,
anecdotes to make his meaning clear.
For example, there is the story of the young disciple of Confucius
who plans to go to a nearby country in political and moral chaos, and
rectify the ruler and the people. He
is warned by a Taoist sage that by taking the moral high-ground he will
only offend and alienate the barbarous, immoral ruler and get himself
killed. Better, says the sage, is to mirror the criminal
behaviour of the ruler and gain his confidence, see his perspective, and
then guide him back towards the Tao without trying to or intending to. One of my own clients, a former student in
his early thirties who shows signs of manic/depressive behaviour sometimes
visits me in his high energy phase and I usually just join in with him
in his zealous frenzy (so that he doesn’t feel he is too 'abnormal'),
and when he is down, I sometimes join him, but at other times buoy him
up without consciously trying to lift his spirits (to reassure him indirectly,
without saying so, that his condition is transient and nothing to worry
about). Once again, as I’m sure Chuang Tzu would agree,
everything depends on the particular circumstances (which are always in
flux). One last story from the
Chuang Tzu which illustrates his moral
(or amoral) point of view, is the story about the virtues of thieves. Thieves have their own virtues, he says; for
example, wisdom is required in knowing when to rob a house, courage is
required to enter and steal, and justice is required to fairly divide
up the stolen loot. Such stories
in the Chuang Tzu, like good poetry, usually have
more than one meaning (depending on one’s perspective). Perhaps part of Chuang Tzu’s meaning is to
warn us again that what we perceive as 'virtue' may be from a different
angle 'vice', and vice versa.
Chuang Tzu’s perspectivalism
is closely related to cultural and ethical relativism. Earlier, we noted the difference between various conceptions of
virtue and competing lists of the virtues in the West, as well as somewhat
different notions of 'virtue' in the Chinese philosophical tradition. Even within the Chinese culture there are other,
different, notions of what constitutes virtue. The Book of Changes (I Ching), for example, emphasises timing,
generosity, caution, and especially modesty and humility, which, as MacIntyre
notes, “could appear in no [MacIntyre’s emphasis] Greek list of the virtues.” This fact militates, not so much against the
idea that virtue and wisdom should play some role in philosophical counselling,
as it does against the idea that there are any definite virtues which
are universal. It looks very much
as though 'virtue' and 'wisdom' are cultural constructs (just as, for
example, each culture has its own ideology of love and death), which are
culture-bound and culturally relative.
This fact is especially important for the philosophical counsellor
(or psychotherapist) engaging in cross-cultural ('trans-cultural') counselling. It seems obvious that the counsellor should
be sensitive (and informed, as far as possible) about the cultural background
and values of clients from cultures alien to his own. Chinese people (and Asians in general), for example do not highly
value directness, frankness, and openness in the expression of emotions,
in the way most Westerners do. They also tend to somatise emotional and cognitive
problems; rather than complain of anxiety for example, they tend to describe
their discomfort as a physical discomfort or problem (headache, stomach-ache,
etc.) In the end, it would seem
that just as the client must find his own way out of his difficulty (albeit
with the sometimes active, sometimes passive, assistance of his counsellor),
likewise he must decide for himself what constitutes a life of 'virtue'
and 'wisdom'. It is also perhaps
interesting to note that in modern Chinese the words for 'virtue' and
'wisdom' are mei-te and chih-hui, respectively. 'Mei-te' is especially interesting since the
two components of this compound, mei
and te mean respectively beautiful
(or, alternatively, excellent) and virtue (as we already noted earlier
in discussion of classical Chinese conceptions of virtue – te). The implications are
very suggestive; for example, the contemporary Chinese conception of virtue
seems to connote virtuous behaviour and feelings which are somehow beautiful
or attractive to observe, or are 'excellent' (fulfilling human nature,
in a not un-Aristotelian way).
If one were to ask what virtues
are necessary or useful in other professions (say, teaching, engineering,
cooking, etc.), and what wisdom would be in the proper conduct of those
professions, it would seem reasonable to begin by defining the profession
in question, and its ends (both in the sense of its aims or goals, and
in the sense of when it may be considered to have reached an end, or terminal
point). It seems reasonable to proceed in the same
way with philosophical counselling. Unfortunately,
if we ask what philosophy is, or what counselling is, we find that these
terms are notoriously difficult to define in a way that would be universally
(all times, all places) accepted. What philosophy is, is of course, itself a
philosophical question. And not
only are there widely variant definitions of philosophy according to different
philosophers, and different philosophical cultures/traditions, but as
Spinelli points out in regard to counselling, it seems there is only a
Wittgensteinian family resemblance between all the different things going
under the name philosophy (and likewise for counselling, or philosophical
counselling), such that there is apparently no definitive set of necessary
and sufficient conditions/criteria which all and only instances of philosophy
(or counselling, or philosophical counselling) have in common.
In this situation, where it appears virtually impossible to agree
on a definition of philosophy, or counselling, or philosophical counselling,
how are we determine the proper ends of philosophical counselling and
the virtues required of the philosophical counsellor or client?
In conclusion, whereas MacIntyre
seems worried that we have lost touch with the moral traditions within
which moral discourse about virtues is inevitably embedded (thus making
it impossible, he claims, to rationally resolve moral disputes), and whereas
Heidegger was worried that modern philosophers have forgotten about Being
(Sein), I would emphasise that something
has gone wrong in modern philosophy, insofar as philosophers today rarely
discuss, or even raise the question, “What is wisdom?” Perhaps we philosophical counsellors and practitioners
can revive this dormant tradition, and help philosophy return to its roots.
References
Boele, D. (1997) The
Benefits of a Socratic Dialogue Or: Which Results can we Promise (Inquiry
:17:3)
Franklin, B. (1996) Autobiography,
Dover and many other editions
Jopling, D. (1997) 'First
do No Harm': Over-Philosophising
and Pseudo-Philosophising in Philosophical Counselling (Inquiry,17:2)
Maxmen, J. and Ward, N. (1995) Essential Psychopathology and its Treatment, Norton
Schaeffer, J.D. (1990) Sensus
Communis: Vico, Rhetoric, and the Limits of Relativism, Durham, London:
Duke University Press.
Spinelli, E. (1994)
Demystifying Therapy, Constable
